A local Mensa man gets a presidential nod.

Earlier this summer, Francis Cartier of Pacific Grove received this year’s President’s Call to Service Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to individuals who have given a minimum of 4,000 volunteer service hours. He was one of 11 members of Mensa—whose goal is, in part, “to identify and foster human intelligence for the benefit of humanity”—to receive the award.

Cartier, 83, received his doctorate in speech science from University of Southern California and worked at DLI’s Foreign Language Center as director of curriculum and test development. He served in World War II as a bombardier, and writes poetry.

Cartier recently gave the Weekly a peek into the life of a giving genius.

WEEKLY: OK, what is your IQ?

CARTIER: Mensa doesn’t go by IQ tests because different tests yield different scores. They go by a test that generates a percentile, so if you’re above the 98th percentile, you are eligible to be a member. According to one test, I am in the top 1 percent.

WEEKLY: What’s the weirdest thing about smart people?

CARTIER: We’re no weirder than ordinary people and we don’t behave any better, either. A high IQ is an aptitude for behaving intelligently; it doesn’t not predict that you will behave intelligently. Mensa people are verbal, so we talk! Some listening occurs occasionally. The fun thing is that we use extensive vocabularies and make allusions to Greek mythology and expect to be understood.

WEEKLY: What did you spend those community service hours doing?

CARTIER: I am on the board of the Mensa Education and Research Foundation. I am also the chairman of the New Projects Committee. I write a column for the Mensa Research Journal, mainly about improved identification of gifted children. I believe that gifted children should receive appropriate educational opportunities, and am interested in how the education system should be adapted for fast learners.

WEEKLY: What’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever done?

CARTIER: I don’t know; my mind erases those.